David Carr has a piece about how the rumored Apple tablet may be able to save print media:

The tablet represents an opportunity to renew the romance between printed material and consumer. Think of sitting in your living room, in your bed or on a plane with a publication you really adore nestled into your lap. Since print was first conceived, people have had an intimate relationship with the text, touching, flipping and paging back and forth.

The tablet, properly executed, will be an iPhone on steroids, and anybody who has spent any time with that device knows that much of its magic lies in replicating that intimate offline navigation. It is a very human, almost innate, urge — readers want to touch what they are seeking to learn.

Honestly, I think this is sheer wankery—any time you’re betting that a new technology that doesn’t yet exist will save an industry via a new business model that doesn’t yet exist, you’re probably wrong.

And yet I find the idea kind of intriguing. There is something about the lay-out of hard-copy papers that I prefer to online editions (even though I mostly read online editions) and in some ways I prefer reading the NYT on my iPhone to reading it online (I also like the Sportacular and Fandango Apps better than their online counterparts).

Do any of you think there is any way some kind of table device could revive the print media industry? Obviously, it’s unlikely, but is there any chance? I assume a lot of you know much more about this stuff than I do.

By Request.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Republicans’ best shot to regain power is to screw the country up as much as possible:

Polarization isn’t a new story, nor were California’s budget problems and constitutional handicap. Yet the state let its political dysfunctions go unaddressed. Most assumed that the legislature’s bickering would be cast aside in the face of an emergency. But the intransigence of California’s legislators has not softened despite the spiraling unemployment, massive deficits and absence of buoyant growth on the horizon. Quite the opposite, in fact. The minority party spied opportunity in fiscal collapse. If the majority failed to govern the state, then the voters would turn on them, or so the theory went.

That raises a troubling question: What happens when one of the two major parties does not see a political upside in solving problems and has the power to keep those problems from being solved?

If all this is sounding familiar, that’s because it is. Congress doesn’t need a two-thirds majority to get anything done. It needs a three-fifths majority, but that’s not usually available, either. Ever since Newt Gingrich partnered with Bob Dole to retake the Congress atop a successful strategy of relentless and effective obstructionism, Congress has been virtually incapable of doing anything difficult because the minority party will either block it or run against it, or both. And make no mistake: Congress will need to do hard things, and soon.

I realize this is a tired old song, but there are a myriad of other things about our system that aren’t set up well for the current state of affairs. No matter how crazy the Republican party gets, they’ll still get their airtime on Dancin’ Dave, in the Politico, and in the Kaplan editorial page. It’s actually even a bit worse than that: saner elements of the Republican party will get no more airtime through these or other outlets than the Khmer Rogue gets. If anything they’ll get less.

Some of you have pointed out that there are things about California that aren’t mirrored at the federal level: the weird state constitution, a higher level of gerrymandering, less media scrutiny, for example. But neither is there the same level of organization on the right as there is at the federal level—no Heritage Foundation, no Moonie Times, no Fox, Wall Street Journal, at least not on the same scale. And the problems the federal government faces are more complicated and therefore easier to bullshit about.

Bored.

Anyone know how to spec a ret pally? Haven’t played for months.

The Steelers defense is going to blow a 17 point lead to a third string QB. In normal years I would be having chest pains, but I called this on twitter about a half hour ago.

It would be a perfect end to a shitacular Steelers season, and would allow us to avoid being humiliated in the playoffs. I’ve never had less faith in a Steelers team than this one.

Good thing we let Bryant McFadden go…

*** Update ***

To paraphrase Winston Churchill, yes, Ann, the president is tired, but tomorrow he will be rested, and you will probably still be drunk. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Glenn Reynolds gets in on the act too.

In a world where conservative Senate leaders diagnose brain dead women via video, it is hardly surprising that conservative bloggers make foreign policy judgements via Flickr.

Update. Tbogg has some good pictures too.

Apparently the Steelers brought their offense but not their defense.

The NY Times with yet another exclusive on the pains and hurt feelings of the super-rich pricks who brought us the current financial meltdown:

Over the last two years, Mr. Weill has watched Citi — a company he built brick by brick during the final act of a 50-year career — nearly fall apart. Although every taxpayer in the country has paid for Citi’s outsize mistakes, for Mr. Weill the bank’s myriad woes are a commentary on his life’s work.

***

Mr. Weill built his wealth, status and power by creating what was once the world’s largest bank. Now, as Citi struggles to regain its footing, Mr. Weill’s legacy has taken on a darker hue. Though he was once viewed as a brilliant dealmaker, some critics now cast him as the architect of a shoddily constructed, unmanageable financial supermarket whose troubles have sideswiped investors, employees and average citizens nationwide.

***

During a series of recent interviews, Mr. Weill spoke candidly about the loss, frustration and humiliation caused by Citi’s fall. “I feel incredibly sad,” he says. He remains baronially wealthy, but says he has endured financial pain, too: until a year ago, he says, the bulk of his investment portfolio was split equally between Citi stock and Treasuries.

Baronially wealthy means he still has more money than every reader of this website… combined. But he does feel sad and his legacy has a “darker hue,” so you have that.

I’m just kind of speechless. Up next, a NY Times exclusive on the luxuries Bernie Madoff misses most.

Apparently Fox News is no longer content being the voice of the GOP, and has decided to become the voice of Christianity, as well:

Brit Hume had some advice for Tiger Woods during this week’s “Fox News Sunday.” Woods will recover as a golfer, Hume says, but it remains to be seen whether he will recover as a person.

“He’s said to be a Buddhist,” Hume said. “I don’t think that faith offers the kind of forgiveness and redemption that is offered by the Christian faith. ... Tiger, turn to the Christian faith and you can make a total recovery.”

Tell me again- why don’t the other networks go after Fox news on a daily basis? Shouldn’t it be in their interest to expose these hacks and frauds for what they are? Wouldn’t it just make sense from a competition standpoint, if pride in the profession is not enough?

I’m not dead, but I feel like I am close. Another day of zinc, vitamin C, decongestant, and La-Z-Boy. Good thing is I have no fever, just those full body aches and the sinus and chest stuff. I’m being philosophical about this- I’m just getting a few of the shitty days of 2010 out of the way early. If I have not answered your email, just hold tight.

It is also cold as hell here- wind whipping and 5-10 degrees outside. Glasses fogged upfor two minutes when I came back inside.

And Go Steelers. Apparently there is a way for them to still get in the playoffs, but it would not surprise me if they lose to the Dolphins. They’ve lost to crappy teams all year, might as well lose to one more.

From a pretty interesting article about 2010 House fundraising:

Harrison acknowledges that nearly every one of the party’s challengers will be outspent next year, and he has been training recruits to run lean and effective underdog campaigns. But he also noted that Republicans were greatly outspent in nearly every race in the wave year of 1994 but still managed to pick up 52 seats.

“We’ve got to get back down to the simple blocking-and-tackling of campaigns. There is no one silver bullet. [Republicans] got to a point in the majority where they believed in the silver bullet — you outspend the other side. That’s not a typical Republican race,” said Harrison.

He makes a reasonable point about 1994 and I would like to see more data about fundraising and winning elections, but it’s pretty clear that everyone in Congress thinks fundraising is the key to getting re-elected—it’s why Congressmen so often do the bidding of bankers, insurance companies, etc.

My sense from following a lot of contested local Congressional elections in 2006 and 2008 is that, yes, candidates can live off the fat of the land and hope to get lucky in a wave year, but, in the end, challengers aren’t going to win a lot of races where they get badly outspent.

I’m watching John’s show here—CBS Sunday Morning—and they’re talking to Chris Hitchens and Jon Meacham. Is nothing sacred?

Watching Forbidden Kingdom on Showtime, another cheesy Jackie Chan vehicle, and I must just be a sucker for these things, but I’m having a lot of fun. At any rate, it features the drunken fist style, and that reminded me of one of the classics:

The drunken master style was the most fun of the styles in Jade Empire, too. Wonder why it was never made into a sequel.

I’m rambling.

Over at the Atlantic, Andrew Cohen has an anti-mass media screed that I very much enjoyed reading but also think is completely wrong. Here’s a sample:

“Democracy demands wisdom” sounds great as a slogan but no has any relevance in a world where even the highly educated don’t take the time to sort sizzle from steak. It’s no wonder most of our politicians are vacuous and venal. They are being elected by people who are too busy or too bored or too lazy to do anything other than cup an ear for the loudest, cleverest, most dramatic sounds emitting from their televisions, computers or PDAs. Industry insiders often call this “noise” and imply that it’s the “white” kind, on in the background but harmless to the health and welfare of everyday life. It is not. It is a deafening roar, America is listening to it (but only half of it, remember) and it is harming, not strengthening, our national interest.

Indeed, sadly, we have both the government and the news industry we deserve. Tens of millions of people now form their dogged (unfounded, hysterical, self-defeating, etc.) opinions about politics (and law and governance and history and science) based upon the sly words and dramatic performances of modern-day carnival barkers, false prophets and snake-oil salesmen like Glenn Beck and Lou Dobbs and Bill O’Reilly and Nancy Grace. Like Sinclair Lewis’ irrepressible Elmer Gantry, these charlatans all share the same cynical inside joke: The louder you scream, the more people will watch; the bigger the conspiracy you allege, the more people will believe it; the more outrage you offer up, the more passionate and prolonged will be the response. It’s about entertainment, not news, and these people and many more are laughing at us all the way to the bank; the latest generation in a long line of American demagogues.

[....]

Intellectual honesty and rigor, or reasoned, dispassionate analysis, is for wimps, public television and the occasional unscripted moment on the Sunday shows. This paradigm wouldn’t have been tolerated by news executives even ten years ago. The media’s wall separating Church (editorial) from State (corporate) was weakening back then. But it’s virtually gone today. News executives embrace the theatrical without apparent shame. No wonder that reality-show-wannabes are doing all sorts of idiotic things these days to get on the news. They realize that everything now is in play; that the networks and cable outlets will cover stories that aren’t news, so long as they get a rise out of their audiences.

As much as I like the general spirit here, I don’t like it when people talk about what “we deserve” because I don’t know who “we” is. Perhaps a Glenn Beck-watching American deserves an awful economy and a screwed-up government but why does a Frontline-watching American deserve it?

Also, it’s fundamentally wrong to say that the media of ten years ago was that much better than today’s media’s or that Beckism is the underlying problem here. It was the New York Times, not Fox, that played the biggest role in pimping bogus pre-war Iraq intel, it was the crazed proclamations of Bob Woodward’s maestro Alan Greenspan that fueled the real estate bubble, not Glenn Beck’s goldbug hysteria, and respected Washington insiders led the impeachment witch hunt as much as Fox News did.

The failures of the last ten years were failures of elites.

I still recommend reading Cohen’s piece. I like how shrill it is. And I honestly believe that if establishment journalists became more blunt and shrill, our public discourse would improve.

I realize this is probably childish and nihilistic, but I consider Stephen Colbert’s routine at the at the 2006 White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner to be the political highlight of the past decade. I was surprised to learn that Colbert thought about taking it even farther and that Tony Snow and Antonin Scalia were complimentary about it:

Colbert disclosed that he did substantial self-editing upon looking at the president and discerning that he wasn’t ecstatic. He had planned to play off Medal of Freedom awards Bush had given former CIA Director George (“It’s a slam dunk”) Tenet and former Iraq administrator L. Paul Bremer; joshing about how Bush was clearly giving awards to everybody in sight.

“’But nobody gives this man an award,’” Colbert recalled as the thrust of the riff he scrapped. “’That ends tonight. I’m going to give the highest honor I can give….a certificate of presidency.’”

It would be akin to “something you get from The Learning Annex for taking a course. ‘I, Stephen Colbert, acknowledge…’” Colbert looked at Bush and said to himself, “I’m going nowhere near this.”

When the dinner was over, “I don’t think I’m dying. I go to sit down and nobody’s meeting my eye. Only [the late journalist-turned-White House spokesman] Tony Snow comes over and says I’m doing a great job.” Then Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia came his way and told him he was brilliant.